will stand above politics to defend her. that we will do everything in our power to protect our constitution and our freedom that has been paid for by the blood of so many. we must love america so much that we will never yield in her defense. that is our duty. thank you. >> after house republicans removed liz cheney is conference chair, they elected elise stefanik to replace her. following the vote, she spoke to reporters along with minority leader, kevin mccarthy and steve scalise.

mr. mccarthy: good morning. we just had an we've got a gasoline lines, we have stations that have no gas, we have gasoline in virginia that's $10 a gallon. we have month core inflation we have not seen since the 80's. nally since the last time joe biden was in the white house. we got the arrests along the border the highest it's been in two months, more than 170,000. the health crisis. the security crisis where we're catching people who are on the terrorist watch list. inflation is a tax on every single american. this is not where we were 18 months ago. it's where we were when jimmy carter was president.

we got people giving incentives to not go to work when he was millions of jobs that need to be filled. we got children still out of school. millions of them. we got congress run by the democrats that pay you even if you don't show up for work. we believe in putting the american people first. our focus is back to work, back to school, back to health, and back to normal. we're thankful for operation warp speed. just yesterday, c.d.c. stated you do not have to wear a mask if you're vaccinated. i believe in the vaccine. i believe in the ingenuity of america. i also believe we shouldn't give that away for free. with that, i want to call up our whip, steve scalise. mr. scalise: thank you, kevin. i also want to congratulate our new conference chair, elise stefanik. congratulations.

you're going to do a great job. our conference is incredibly unified right now but we're also very concerned because america is experiencing numerous crises. all across the board, you're seeing president biden fail to lead this nation through some unprecedented serious problems that are affecting everyday hard working families. it's not just in america we're seeing crises. across the globe, you see, right now, thousands of rockets going off in the middle east, israel under attack. where is president biden's leadership? he spent more time negotiating to help iran get toward a nuclear weapon than to confront the problems of hamas and palestinians attacking israel. you're seeing russia continue to be on the move. not only is russia on the move in eastern europe, russia is attacking america's pipelines. and what is president biden doing? he's making it easier for russia to send us gasoline, to be more

reliant on russia and middle eastern oil because he shut off the spigots. it's not only the keystone pipeline he shut down. he also canceled leases and permits on drilling in federal land, making americans less energy secure. that means families are pay manager money at the pump. when you see lines at the pump, that's something people haven't seen, like our leader said, since the 1970's. this is because of president biden's failed leadership. where is he on these problems? why has not president biden nor vice president harris gone to the border? the border crisis has been created by president biden's failed policy. we had a secure border when he took the oath of office and he quickly unraveled those agreements, including really good negotiated agreements with mexico and the northern triangle countries, that had president biden creating the border crisis and he wants to blame it on other people. there used to be a marker on the president's desk that says, the

buck stops here. president biden is hoping these problems go away while he creates more crises. if someone is trying to buy a new house it's going to cost $36,000 more because of the skyrocketing costs of lumber. there's over eight million job openings and every small business owner can't find workers because president biden insisted he pays people not to work. estimates are there's hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud in that program he created and he refuses to confront these problems. these are problems that we're going to confront as house republicans, house republicans are very unified in confronting the challenges facing this country. we're going to work on those problems every single day in an even more united way. that's why we're proud that elise got elected today. now i want to bring up our conference vice chair, also from the state of louisiana, mike johnson.

mr. johnson: thanks, steve. on behalf of the conference i'm delighted to be the first, i think, to publicly at least in broad setting congratulate elise stefanik on her election as our newest republican conference chair. that is a critical season for us, an important time for the country as has been said, all these great challenges articulated here and the american people know we have an important job to do. elise did a great job over the last several day, extraordinary job, reaching out to every member of the conference, showing a vision for unified leadership, agreeing to work with everyone in our conference to bring to bear the important task ahead of us. we are excited, we are unified, there's a great feeling coming out of that auditorium today. we are ready to face this challenge to present this vision to get our message to the american people and to take back the house in 2022. without further ado let me introduce you to our new conference chair, congresswoman

stefanik of no. ms. stefanik: i want to thank my colleagues for the opportunity to serve as house republican conference chair. i have prioritized listening to all members of our republican conference and my focus is on unity, because that's what the american people and that's what our voters deserve. i also want to thank this leadership team, i look forward to working with them in partnership, shoulder-to-shoulder, to make sure that we are fighting on behalf of hard-working americans. i also want to thank president trump for his support. he is a critical part of our republican team. and of course, most importantly, i want to thank the voters of new york's 21st congressional district who i'm honored to represent each and every day and fight for them. the american people are suffering under the far left radical socialist policies of president joe biden and speaker nancy pelosi. in just over 100 day, we have an economic crisis, we have a border crisis, and we have a national security crisis.

the economic crisis, we see the worst jobs report in over 20 years. unemployment is up. small businesses are struggling to hire workers, and speaker pelosi and joe biden's solution to that is to pay people to stay out of work rather than incentivizing people to get back to work. as republicans we are fighting to reopen the economy, to create jobs, we are fighting against the trillions of dollars of tax increases and the trillions of dollars of reck he spending. the border crisis. this is not only a national security and homeland security crisis. this is a humanitarian crisis. we see historic concerning numbers when it comes to human trafficking on the border. when it comes to trafficking on the border. every single state in this nation is a border state and feels that impact. at home in my district, the northern border is impacted because border patrol officers are being transferred from the northern border to the southern border. republicans stand for border security. and of course the national

security crisis. we are seeing our strongest ally, israel, under attack and we have seen joe biden and nancy pelosi not step up to stand by and support israel and prioritize outreach to adversaries like china and iran. so i'm very excited for this opportunity. we are unified, working as one team, and the american people know that the stakes are incredibly high. we are going to fight for them each and every day against the disruptive, radical far left socialist agenda of president joe biden and nancy pelosi that's destroying america. i'll go to the first question, the new york post, julie. reporter: you came under fire about your record. are you concerned about -- how do you overcome that? ms. stefanik: the republican party is a big tent party. my district is the story of the growth of the republican party my district voted for president

obama by double digits and voted for president trump and myself by double digits. nancy pelosi has her slimmest majority in a generation. we are going on the offense and are going to win back the majority in 2022. this is about being unified. i'm a proud conservative republican and i will fight for the republican conference. scott. reporter: is president trump the leader of the republican party? ms. stefanik: i believe voters determine the leader of the republican party. president trump is the lead they look. to he's an important voice in our republican party and we look forward to working with him. reporter: as long as you have some members who support the former president and some who don't. ms. stefanik: we are unified. republican voters are unified in their support and desire to work with president trump. we are unified as republicans, as i said, this is the slimmest majority that nancy pelosi has

in a generation. we picked up a number of seats despite expectations. we are going on offense and we are going to win on the issues because people are understanding that joe biden's pledge to -- of bipartisanship, he has broken that pledge since his first day in office. there has been no bipartisan outreach. it has been party line, partisan, far-left votes and the american people are seeing the disastrous results in the border crisis, the economic crisis, the national security crisis and more. the american people are hurting. and republicans are going to fight for them. reporter: i heard chip roy was -- \[inaudible] ms. stefanik: i think competition is good in america. we should have a discussion of ideas. i welcome the competition. i'm honored for the support. we are working as one team. my job as house republican conference chair, we are focused on putting forth policies and communicating them to the american people to be to the beat democrats and we are going

to win the majority in 2022 as one team. reporter: is there a place in the party for vocal trump critics like liz cheney, like adam kinzinger? ms. stefanik: liz cheney is part of this conference, adam kinzinger is part of this conference, they were elected and sent here, we are unified in working with president trump. my job representing our republican members, we look forward to working with president trump. reporter: have you talked to liz cheney? ms. stefanik: i have not. mr. mccarthy: i want to wish our policy chair here happy birthday. so you all remember the birthday song? here we go. ♪ this is your birthday